Review | With energetic Beethoven and dramatic Brahms, pianist and cellist in Hong Kong duo recital show their chemistry
- Alexander Krichel played the piano parts with sensitivity and Maximilian Hornung the cello parts with daring and panache in sonatas by Beethoven and Brahms
- Krichel showed control but a narrow colour range in Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition; Hornung couldn’t lend shape to a Dieter Ammann contemporary work
One could spot them hundreds of metres away. Purse or jacket in hand, trotting along at a brisk pace, one eye on the watch, music lovers came out of the woodwork to gather at Hong Kong City Hall for the duo recital by Maximilian Hornung (cello) and Alexander Krichel (piano) on November 15.
Inside, the atmosphere was electric in the lobby as the crowd waited in the slow-moving queue going into the concert hall.
We have to thank Covid-19 for the extraordinary surge of interest in cultural performances that has, on the flip side, made tickets harder to come by. With more overseas musicians now willing to travel to the city thanks to the relaxation of entry restrictions, audiences have been filling halls to capacity. For their part, presenters have also been coming up with more unusual, yet enticing programmes.
Hornung and Krichel’s recital, presented by the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, is a case in point. The duo put together an ambitious programme: each half of the concert featured a solo as well as a duo sonata for piano and cello.
Krichel’s unfailing sense of rhythm and control in Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition unified what might otherwise pass as a loose-knit collection of character piano pieces. But the brisk tempos and the narrow range of colours made the work sound like a series of anecdotal vignettes.
